The DruGS team recently completed a professional consultation conducted on efforts to address young people’s use of e-cigarettes or vaping. Debate continues on how to balance the harm reduction potential of e-cigarettes against concerns about their potential risks. Key concerns include the acute harms of vaping and its potential to ‘normalise’ nicotine consumption, including smoking. Responding to these debates, our consultation sought to examine how key professionals working in e-cigarette policy and practice approach young people’s vaping, the policy directions and interventions they value and how research may contribute to future responses.

A collaboration between DruGS Program Lead Dr Adrian Farrugia, Dr Kiran Pienaar (Deakin University) and Professor Sarah MacLean (La Trobe University), the project team conducted interviews with 11 professionals working in roles related to e-cigarettes – researchers, policy professionals, public health professionals and those providing treatment – to explore their views on key issues for policy and practice responses to young people’s vaping. 

While the views recorded in the report vary considerably, it records a shared commitment to supporting the health and well-being of all people, including young people who take up vaping and/or smoking. Overall, the perspectives recorded through the research emphasise the need to examine how:

• Policy and regulatory responses shape young people’s vaping and smoking immediately and over time;
• Young people assess and make use of public health messages and other forms of information about vaping;
• Vaping takes shape within young people’s whole lives;
• Vaping and smoking tobacco intersect; and
• Professionals develop their understandings of and approaches to e-cigarette regulations and vaping in general.

As Adrian explains,

In many ways this consultation raised more questions than it resolved. It revealed a highly contested field in which key professionals offered diverse and even diametrically opposed perspectives on the potential harms of vaping and how to respond to young people’s vaping specifically. 

A copy of the report is available online.

The project investigator team comprised:

• Dr Adrian Farrugia (ARCSHS, La Trobe University)
• Dr Kiran Pienaar (Deakin University)
• Prof. Sarah MacLean (La Trobe University)

The project staff comprised:

• Julia De Nicola (La Trobe University)